Thousands of Calif inmates refuse meals in protest

By DON THOMPSON Associated Press

Posted:
07/09/2013 11:28:09 AM PDT

Updated:
07/09/2013 02:39:01 PM PDT

SACRAMENTO, Calif.—More than 30,000 of the 133,000 inmates in California prisons have refused at least one meal in support of inmates held in solitary confinement at Pelican Bay State Prison, corrections officials said Tuesday.

The meals were refused on Monday as inmates announced what they said would be the third extended hunger strike in two years protesting conditions for the more than 4,500 gang members, gang associates and serious offenders held in the security housing units.

The isolation units are at Pelican Bay near the Oregon border and at three other maximum security prisons around the state.

Inmates refused breakfast at two-thirds of the state's 33 prisons and at all four private prisons that hold California inmates in other states, said Terry Thornton, a spokeswoman for the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

She did not have updated information about how many inmates skipped subsequent meals.

About 2,300 inmates statewide also refused to go to their jobs or classes on Monday.

The initial day of the protest eclipsed two hunger strikes two years ago. Nearly 12,000 inmates missed at least some meals in October 2011, and nearly 7,000 declined meals in July 2011, though officials said most began eating again after several days.

Pelican Bay inmates said through advocacy groups that the protest began after talks with prison officials broke down last month over inmates' demands that the department end long-term solitary confinement than can last for decades.

Thornton said the department changed its policies last year to give gang associates a way out of the units.

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About half of the nearly 400 inmates considered so far have been or will be let out of solitary confinement, while another 115 are in a program in which they can work their way out of the units, Thornton said.

A federal judge in April refused to dismiss a lawsuit filed by 10 Pelican Bay inmates alleging their living conditions in the isolation units are unconstitutionally cruel and unusual punishment